


Make Him Pay

by Sebastian_the_Mercat



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-05
Updated: 2015-12-05
Packaged: 2018-05-05 02:47:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5358107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sebastian_the_Mercat/pseuds/Sebastian_the_Mercat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Max can't let Chloe die...but the universe won't move on without someone dying. Someone has to die...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Make Him Pay

**Author's Note:**

> Salutations. Writing this hurt my heart. Enjoy!
> 
> Warnings: Major character death, cursing, the usual.
> 
> Pairing: Pricefield
> 
> Important Note: This was written after the release of the dreadful episode 5. This takes place during the "sacrifice Chloe" ending, but changes...pretty quickly.

Max blinked the shuttering of the camera in her hands jolting her back into awareness. She looked up just in time to see the electric blue butterfly flit up over her head, landing on a sink.

And then the door clicked open and Nathan Prescott entered. Max squeezed her eyes shut, feeling sick.

Sitting down on the floor, her back to the stall, she listened to Nathan's stuttering breathing, his panicked words distantly. Distantly, Nathan's voice drifted into her head (the same, but oh so different). The words filled with agony, the words that only a person that knew they were going to die could murmur, the words filled with such sincerity as they apologized to her through space and time...

He helped her more than she ever helped him.

Max bowed her head in between her legs in agony.

"Did you check the perimeter as my step ass would say?"

And with those words, Max felt a sob building up in her chest. This Nathan, this Chloe...they hadn't experienced the things Max had, they had no idea what they had all gone through in the past week. She felt a solitary tear fall from her eye.

She couldn't do it. Not to Chloe, not to Nathan, not to anyone.

"You don't know who the FUCK I am, or WHO you're messing around with!"

"Get that gun away from me psycho-"

"Stop!" Max screamed, rounding the corner of the stall.

She hadn't used her powers, she hadn't froze time...but judging by the expressions on both Chloe and Nathan's faces, you'd have thought she had.

"What the fuck-" Nathan began.

"Max?! Max Caulfield?!" Chloe exclaimed, her eyes growing impossibly wide.

Max felt her breaths coming quick, the tears still falling down her cheeks. She couldn't take her eyes off the gun held in Nathan's shaking hand. However, she knew she had to work quick. She was running out of time.

How ironic.

"S...stop," she whispered, her words stuttering. "Please...please, just listen to me." Max took a deep breath. "You have to...you have to believe me..."

Chloe's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "Max, what the fuck are you talking about? And why the fuck haven't you talked to me-"

Nathan on the other hand, looked like he was on the verge of either a panic attack or about to go on a murdering spree, his teeth clenched and body shaking.

Max felt her head beginning to ache. She needed to say something now, before it was too late.

"Chloe, please, just listen-"

Nathan suddenly decided to say something. "Both of you should shut the fuck up or I'm going to-"

"Nathan! You don't want to hurt us! You don't want to hurt anyone, right?!" Max finally exploded. "You didn't want to hurt Kate, or Rachel, or anyone else! But HE made you! HE made you believe you were worth something, that HE cared! HE manipulated you, Nathan! I...I know you're good, Nathan." Both Chloe and Nathan stared at her in shock, after her outburst. Once again, Nathan's desperate words in that voicemail rang through her head. "I...I know..."

Chloe suddenly pushed the stunned Nathan out of the way, causing him to crash into the sinks. He didn't try to right himself, though, merely staring at Max wide-eyed.

"Max," Chloe snapped, getting in her face. "What are you talking about?!"

"Chloe..." Max whispered, feeling the tears building up behind her eyes once more. Without warning, she threw her arms around Chloe's neck. "Oh, Chloe! Chloe, I'm so sorry! I'm sorry I wasn't there for you when William - when your dad died! I'm sorry I wasn't around when Joyce married David - but David, I know you hate him but he actually cares about you so much! He cares about you so so much, Chloe! And...he just wants you safe! I just want you safe and happy! And I'm so sorry about Rachel, I'm sure she was an amazing friend, your angel! I'm so sorry what happened to her, but you're not alone! Everyone loved Rachel, especially Frank! And Frank...he's not as bad as you think, he just is rough around the edges...he just loved Rachel so much, just like she loved him, and Nathan, he's not a bad person, just like you're not. You've done bad things, I know, but you're a god person because you care about people and you don't want people to get hurt...and Nathan, he's...so much like you actually, the both of you...you've both been hurt s-so much...I just...j-just don't want..." Max took a shuddering breath, before sobbing, pushing her face into Chloe's shoulder. "I don't want you to die, Chloe! I want you to live, so so bad...I...I love you Chloe, more than you could ever imagine..."

Suddenly, Chloe was hugging her back, her shoulders shaking minutely as she cried as well. "Max..."

Max pulled back, giving her a small smile.

And then she groaned, as her head pounded in agony. She collapsed back onto the floor, holding her forehead. She was staring up at Chloe and Nathan, who were both looking at her with wide eyes, before they faded away into darkness.

It was like she was thrown into the nightmare all over again.

She was standing atop the lighthouse, staring down at everyone she knew stalking around with flashlights, calling out to her.

But they were all saying the same thing.

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"Someone has to die."

"SOMEONE HAS TO DIE MAX!"

When she blinked once more, she was in the bathroom, Chloe kneeling beside her and shaking her. Nathan still lingered near the sinks, but his eyebrows were furrowed and his shakes had gotten worse. Max looked between the two of them, to the glowing red door of the bathroom.

The universe was calling for death.

"Someone...someone has to die..." Max whispered, choking back a sob. "One of us has to d-die..."

"No!" Chloe exclaimed, helping Max to sit up. "No! I just got you back! I know I don't know how you know all that shit about me and him," she gestured to Nathan, "but I just got you back Max! I can't loose you, either by my death or yours!"

"Chloe..." Max sobbed, feeling like her heart was literally being crushed in her chest. "Chloe, Chloe...Chloe, we have no choice..."

"No! Max, I won't loose you! I refuse!" she whispered, hugging Max to her chest.

Neither of them noticed Nathan, looking between the two, a pained expression on his face. Max's words echoed in his ears. She...she understood him. She hadn't judged him, immediately hating him because of his name, or his mental illness, or even his actions. She...she acted like she got him, that she had actually troubled herself unlike anyone else had.

This girl he didn't really know.

He looked at her sobbing in the arms of Chloe...Chloe who was so much like him and yet so different...after all, she was strong. Stronger than him.

This Max Caulfield...and Chloe Price...together...they could end it all.

It all would be over.

"Max," Nathan found himself speaking, "Chloe..."

The two girls looked up at him, confused. He swallowed hard, closing his eyes, not daring to let the tears swimming in them fall. "Together...you will...end it all, right?" he whispered.

"O-of course," Max whispered back. Chloe gave her a confused look, but Max didn't mind her. She knew exactly what Nathan meant.

Nathan swallowed, before opening his eyes once more. A solitary tear fell from his eye, splashing down on the dirty bathroom floor. He looked between Max and Chloe, before speaking one last phrase.

"Make him pay."

Before Max or Chloe could even yell "stop," Nathan had brought his gun up to his temple, pulling the trigger.

Both of them gasped. Max lunged forward, catching Nathan as he fell, cradling his head in her lap, not minding the blood now soaking through her jeans. Max mindlessly carded her fingers through Nathan's hair, her hand quivering like Nathan's had. Chloe wrapped an arm around her shoulders, shushing her, and only then did she realize she was crying, sobbing.

"He...h-he..."

"I know," Chloe whispered. "I know..."

Max swallowed hard, feeling herself beginning to fall into the darkness. Her last thought, however, before she left that world behind she whispered to Nathan's dead body.

"I'll make him pay, Nathan. I promise."

**Author's Note:**

> OUCH MY HEART! Why do I keep killing this child?! Omg, this is too much.
> 
> Thanks for reading! Please leave a review!


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